it's tragic, really
by ptrpan89
Summary: Stacie often finds herself wishing she had what Beca and Chloe so obviously have. It is such a heartbreaking shame that Stacie doesn't recognize that love even when it's standing right in front of her. Literally waving its hand in front of her face and shoving her favorite delicious and nutritious mango-pineapple smoothie into her hands. It's all rather tragic, really.


**i do not own pitch perfect or its characters. i'm just having some fun. i'm kidding, this was not fun. i was trying to sleep when this invaded my brain.**

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Stacie often finds herself wishing she had what Beca and Chloe so obviously have.

They are experts at the meaningful glance, the silent conversation through eye contact. She has never seen an innocuous touch mean so much as when Beca gets too stressed and Chloe ghosts her fingers along the DJ's arm to calm her, or when Chloe's voice starts to hurt from too much singing and Beca will ask for her to rest two times before firmly placing her hand on the small of the redhead's back and giving a tiny push towards the nearest seat.

Chloe Beale is one of the most talkative, most joyful, most _alive_ people Stacie has ever met but her affection for Beca Mitchell is a quiet, unobtrusive thing. That first year with the Bellas, when Beca was perpetually frustrated, there was a lot of low whispering and surreptitious winks from Chloe, a lot of awkward shuffling and nervous smiles from Beca. Now, in their senior year, it seems the pair are almost always touching. Squished against each other on the otherwise empty couch watching YouTube videos or quietly studying, holding hands while walking for no other reason than that their hands fit together perfectly, leaning against each other with one's head on the other's shoulder during breaks in practice.

They are drawn like magnets to each other and Stacie wants that, desperately.

Beca regularly blows into practice after an exhausting day of classes or another disappointing shift at Residual Heat like a tiny storm cloud bursting with surly annoyance and raining grumpy sass down on everyone near her. On those days Stacie imagines the DJ to be something like a wilting flower, in urgent need of watering and sunshine. Chloe's soft, gentle love kicks it up a notch on those days. She will smile over at Beca more frequently, using her brightest, most blinding smile that is… well, like looking straight into the sun. She will seek out direct eye contact at every given opportunity; her eyes, the color of the ocean, are so big and so beautiful that Beca is helpless against getting sucked in, no matter how salty and irritable. Chloe will employ every trick she has on those days and Stacie always watches with a mixture of amusement and wonder as Beca, the surly and annoyed wilting flower, is watered and blasted with sunshine, gradually standing up straighter, dropping the tension in her shoulders and the downward turn of her mouth, smiling easily once more.

Occasionally, Stacie will catch Beca looking at the redhead in something like confusion, or maybe bewilderment. Like she can't quite work out what she did to deserve someone like Chloe in her life and she's scared out of her mind that she might do something to fuck it all up. Chloe, while not nearly as secretive about her gazing, switches between looking at the DJ like she's been told to solve the world's most difficult and complex puzzle or looking at her with some kind of profound awe like she's the luckiest person on earth to be the closest to Beca, a person who lets people in on an exceedingly rare basis. Stacie has had conversations with Chloe before about just how talented the redhead thinks Beca is and Chloe has always been, and probably will always be her biggest fan, her most steadfast supporter.

So, Stacie can easily see how two people so opposite as them could fall in love. Because, seriously, just about everyone who crosses paths with Chloe, actual ray of sunshine, Beale falls at least a little bit in love with her, and if Beca would just have a modicum of chill and stop with the aggressively antisocial vibe she gives off as a defense mechanism and let more than a select handful of people get to know her, she would be beating them off with a stick, too.

What Stacie thinks is just so immeasurably sad, though, is that they do not realize they are _in love_ with each other. Love, yes, some sort of platonic friendship type of love, absolutely; Chloe will proudly proclaim that love came to be the very moment she set eyes on the alternative girl with scary ear spikes at the activities fair so long ago, and Beca, sweet Beca, only stopped cringing at the mere mention of the word just last year, so.

It's all rather tragic, really.

The point is that Stacie wants that quiet, unobtrusive, _unrelenting_ kind of love. She has had love boldly declared, shamelessly written out, even shoved in her face in front of an audience, but she has never reciprocated the feeling. It was all too gaudy, too _invasive_ , for her taste. She has always found the sort of love that Beca and Chloe share to be more romantic and she realizes that makes her either hopeless or masochistic.

This is why it is such a heartbreaking shame that Stacie doesn't recognize that love, which she wishes for so fervently, even when it's standing right in front of her. Literally waving its hand in front of her face and shoving her favorite delicious and nutritious mango-pineapple smoothie into her hands.

"Hello? Earth to Stacie. Come in, come in." And her best friend can be such a dork sometimes but, honestly, it's charming.

"Sorry, Bree. Thank you." She smiles and presses a quick kiss to Aubrey's cheek before turning and heading towards the parking lot. She does not notice the blonde's pale cheeks flush or the approximate ten seconds it takes for Aubrey's brain to reboot.

Her former captain catches up quickly and snatches Stacie's duffel bag from her shoulder before Stacie can tell her _she's fine, she can carry it herself_ , again. The brunette rolls her eyes as Aubrey marches past her to the passenger side because she knows Aubrey will open the door for her, like always, and Stacie will proceed to demure and look up through her lashes and be grateful, like always. Except this time, as she passes the blonde to slide into her seat, Aubrey stops her and raises a trembling hand to her cheek to smooth her thumb over the dark bags under her eye. "You look exhausted, sweetie."

Stacie closes her eyes, a fraction too long for a blink. "That's because I am. And you know I wont be able to sleep properly until these exams are over so get your cute butt into the car and lets go study." Aubrey doesn't say anything more, though it looks like she wants to, because she is one of the only people with personal knowledge of just how brilliant Stacie actually is, despite how she behaves around others sometimes, and just how seriously she takes her grades.

They make it to Aubrey's apartment in barely any time at all because Aubrey can rave about her job at the weird (creepy) teamwork retreat all she wants but Stacie knows the blonde couldn't bear to be too far away from her baby Bellas, should any of them come calling for help. Aubrey makes Stacie eat a healthy dinner, which has become a regular occurrence on these study nights, and then they migrate towards the couch. Each has her own side but they sit with their legs stretched out along the length, tangled together for warmth, reading and highlighting and jotting notes in comfortable silence for hours.

When the time comes that Stacie cannot concentrate on the text anymore and is becoming more and more frequently distracted by Aubrey's glasses slipping down the bridge of her nose and Aubrey's pursed lips and Aubrey's delicate, long fingers pushing her glasses up and turning pages, she calls it quits. They take turns in the bathroom, they change clothes, and they crawl into the only bed in the apartment.

Stacie does not know that this routine they have shared dozens of times makes the blonde's heart beat too fast, makes her hands shake; she does not know that the reason Aubrey always, _always_ , reads in bed before she can fall asleep is because the way Stacie curls up against her body, with an arm slung over her hips and a leg bent to lay over the tops of her thighs, makes Aubrey's head whirl, makes her mind race.

Stacie does not know any of that and so she falls asleep effortlessly, pressed up against her best friend with her face buried in the blondes neck, feeling content and relaxed in a way she can never quite grasp at the Bella house. She only stirs, much later, when Aubrey shifts to turn off the lamp on the bedside table and presses her lips to Stacie's forehead with a muttered, "Goodnight, sweet girl."

She feels Aubrey settle more comfortably into the bed and finally notices the hand buried in her hair at the nape of her neck. Stacie does not know what she does to Aubrey, how she makes Aubrey feel, so she does not hesitate to tilt her head and kiss the corner of the blonde's jaw. She whispers, "Night, Bree. Love you."

Aubrey lays awake in the darkness for hours before her eyes refuse to stay open any longer.

It's all rather tragic, really.


End file.
